


O plague right well prevented!

by Ship_theboybands



Category: Lovely Little Losers, Nothing Much to Do
Genre: Brothers, Canon Compliant, Family Feels, Gen, M/M, angsty, broken home, sad brothers who love each other really, set from John's birth to end of nmtd era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-12
Updated: 2016-01-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 10:36:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5704510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ship_theboybands/pseuds/Ship_theboybands
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Hi, John,” Peter smiles with all of his teeth.</p><p>John begins to cry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	O plague right well prevented!

Peter is going to be a big brother. He’s going to be the _best_ big brother, actually, in the whole world according to his new t-shirt. Daddy’s been reading him story books about babies, and he’s just sure he’s going to nail it. He’ll hold the baby and make it laugh and let it play with his toys and Mummy and Daddy will tell him he’s done a really god job.

Mummy’s not coming to the hospital because she has to be at work, and Daddy seems very upset about it, so Peter doesn’t ask why Mummy isn’t taking time off.  
Daddy holds his hand as they walk into the hospital room, pulling Peter back as he tries to run ahead.

“Calm, Petey. Come on, be good, you have to be calm,” He says, and Peter does just exactly as Daddy says because he _is_ good. 

So he walks calmly into the room. He waves at Daddy’s friend Susan, who is sitting in the hospital bed and looks very, very tired, and then he creeps over to the little cot in the corner and… and there’s a baby.

It is so cute, and squishy looking, that Peter can’t help but laugh. Daddy sits him down and very carefully helps him hold it, and tells Peter it’s a little boy. His little brother.

Peter is three, which means he is a big boy, and John is zero, which makes him super small. Daddy says that eventually they will start counting how big he is in months, but right now he is not even one month old. Peter looks at him in awe, a miniature little version of a person.

“His name is John,” Susan smiles over at them, and Peter looks down at the baby. He has big eyes, and teeny tiny fingers, and Pedro is so pleased, so excited. 

“Hi, John,” He smiles with all of his teeth.

John begins to cry.

 

“John,” Mummy says, sighing, as she often does, “John, please, that is not how we eat our food.”

“Come on John, be a good boy, like Peter!” Daddy tries, and Peter glows under the praise.

John is squishing his sandwich between his fingers, making a big gloopy mess for how much he’s overworked it, and Peter would be laughing if he didn’t know he’d be scolded for it. He doesn’t think it’s fair, though, that John should be sighed at like that. He’s only just stopped eating baby food, so it’s not like he knows any better. John is two, which means he’s a toddler, which means he doesn’t even understand what they’re saying that well.

“Here, John, like this!” Peter says, lifting his sandwich up with his hands and taking big exaggerated bites. John scrunches up his face and starts to giggle, so Peter amps it up even more, opening his mouth wider and making silly chomping sounds.

“Oh Pete, will you stop that? Eating with your mouth open is such a bad example to set for John,” Mummy scolds him, and so Peter puts his sandwich down.

“Sorry,” He mumbles, looking at his lap. He hates it when Mummy or Daddy tell him off. They always tell him he’s a good boy, and it’s not nice when he lets them down. Not at all.

“It’s alright, sweetheart, just not again, yes?” She says, and Peter nods, still looking at his lap.

“Peter, say you won’t do it again. The impression you make on John is very important,” Daddy says sternly, and he can hear the disappointment in his voice, the frown on his face, without having to look up.

“Oh, leave it, David. Peter isn’t the one misbehaving. You should be focusing on John, he is _your_ son,” Mummy snaps. What she’s saying is weird, and Mummy almost never snaps at Daddy, so it startles Peter enough that he does look up. 

Mummy’s face is hard and angry, and Daddy’s face is shocked, and John is sitting between them, looking up at each of their faces in turn, absently moving the sandwich around his plate.

“He’s… he’s yours too,” Daddy says, uncertainly. “In all the ways that matter.”

There is a long moment where it looks like Mummy might… cry. Peter hopes she doesn’t, he thinks that would very much upset John.

“Yes,” She sighs, laughing. Mummy doesn’t laugh often, but when she does it’s not like that. Not in a way that sounds angry, and mean. “In all the ways that matter, yes, David,” She shakes her head, standing up to leave the table. 

Daddy asks her what she means, and then Mummy is shouting, and Daddy says, “Not in front of them!” 

It is odd for him to say that right then, and Peter wonders why it’s suddenly not alright for him and John to be there. 

Mummy and Daddy storm out of the room, and Peter hears their muffled shouting. John just stares at his sandwich, prodding it.

“Come on, John, like this,” Peter frowns, moving over to sit next to John and help him put little bits of sandwich into his mouth. “You have to be a good boy, John. Please.”

 

Peter starts playing football when he is six years old and he realises that seeing Peter score a goal straightens out the tired lines of Dad’s face, puts a smile on it. Dad asks if he’d like to join the local team, and when Peter says he would Dad cheers, and spins him around in the air. He thinks that when he tells Mum she’ll be the same, but she just smiles a little, ruffling his hair.

“Okay, Petey, if that’s what you want,” She says, and then she heads into the garden for a cigarette, leaving the sink full of her plate and cup and cutlery. Peter remembers how Dad doesn’t like it when she smokes or when she leaves her washing in the sink, how he gets cross and then Mum gets really cross, and so he drags a chair from the kitchen and puts on Mum’s rubber gloves. It doesn’t take long to get it done, and by the time Daddy comes downstairs with John on his shoulders it’s all waiting on the side to dry.

“Where’s Mummy, Pete?” Asks Dad, setting John down on the floor. Peter wishes he was still three and could be carried around on Dad’s shoulders.

“She’s outside,” Peter says, shrugging.

“Is she smoking?” Daddy sighs, and Peter really doesn’t want them to argue, but he knows he must not lie. John is looking up to him with his eyes wide, though, like he knows it too, so Peter shakes his head.

“Peedee, come do colouring?” John asks, and Peter sighs in relief at the subject change.

“Yeah, Dad, do you want to colour with us?” He asks, smiling with his teeth.

Dad does, so they all sit at the dining table colouring, until Mummy walks in and looks over Johns shoulder.

“What are you drawing, Honey?” She asks, and Peter smells the smoke on her breath, but hopes that she’ll leave before Dad does.

“Mummy you smell like ash,” John frowns, and Peter stares at him.

He’s expecting Dad to shout at Mum, so he’s especially shocked and scared when Dad turns to him looking as disappointed as he ever has.

“Peter, why did you lie to me?” He asks, “Mummy has been smoking, and you told me she hasn’t, why would you lie?”

“David-“Mum says, but Dad ignores her, and shouts at Peter again, and Johns lip is trembling because he doesn’t like loud noises, so Peter covers his stupid little ears.

“I’m very sorry,” Peter whispers, “I didn’t want you to be angry.”

“So you lied to me? That doesn’t make sense, Peter!” Dad shouts.

Then Mum says: “David that is so, so rich coming from you.” 

And Dad cries: “How long will you punish me?”

And then they shout more, and Peter leads John out of the kitchen by his hand, and they sit on the garden porch instead.

“Why Mummy says Daddy’s a liar?” John asks, in his quiet voice, looking right at Peter’s face.

“Because your Mummy isn’t the same as mine. Daddy had you with Susan, but Susan didn’t want you anyway, so Mummy takes care of you,” Peter says bitterly, untying and retying his shoe laces.

John pauses.

“Why didn’t Susan want me?” He asks. It’s a very good sentence for a three year old. John is very smart.

Peter opens his mouth to say it’s because John can’t keep his mouth shut. He’s going to say it’s because he’s bad, and that if he doesn’t start being nicer then Mummy and Daddy won’t want him either. But then he remembers that he has to be nice too.

“Because she’s ill,” Peter says honestly.

 

Peter asks very calmly and politely for Susan to put John down.

“Pete, please,” Mum sighs, and Dad tries to hold his hand but he pulls it away. Seven year olds don’t hold their Dads hands.

“He’s my little brother still. Just because all you grownups have made a stupid mess of this doesn’t mean I don’t get to have him,” He says simply, and Susan looks crushed.

“Look, Pete, I wasn’t well enough to take care of John when he was first born-“

“And what’s to say you are now?” Peter asks.

“Pete,” Dad says sternly, and Peter huffs.

“Look, I am so sorry that you and John won’t be living together, but I’ll bring him to visit often,” Susan promises.

“You’re not just taking him out of my house you’re going to a whole different country,” Peter says, and he can’t help the tears from coming. Susan is stupid, and  
England is stupid, and Mum and Dad ae so stupid. But then as soon as he starts crying, John does too. And then Susan, and then Mum, and then Dad. Peter hasn’t ever seen his Dad cry before, and he rushes over to put his arms around his neck. John waddles over to hug Peter, and then Mum hugs Susan and then everyone is hugging.

“I have,” Dad says, “We have made an awful mess of this, boys, and I’m so, so sorry.”

“Okay, Dad,” Peter sniffs, even though it isn’t, even though Mum and Dad won’t live in the same house, and Susan is taking John away, too. Even though Peter has worked so hard to keep them all together and none of it has mattered, he pats Dad on the head and says that it’s okay.

“You are a good boy,” Says Dad, and everyone else agrees.

 

Peter is ten and sitting in the water for a while. He likes to be still for a bit when there’s so much moving going on. None of it’s all that bad. It’s moving to see Mum or moving to see Dad or sometimes moving really far to see John and Susan. None of it’s so sad anymore, and all the adults seem much happier now, so it’s alright really. But when there is a moment to be still, Peter will take it. That’s when the girls all covered in sand start running towards him.

There’s a big one, and a little once, and so he shouts and throws sand, and the little one starts crying.

“Hey, you suck!” Shouts the other one, who looks about his age, and they’re the ones who started running at him in the first place, so he splashes her. And then there’s a war, and then there’s running along the sand, and then there’s falling into it face first and laughing sand out of his mouth.

It turns out the big girl is called Bea, and the little one who he has to apologise to is called Hero. He doesn’t notice his Dad running over to chat to their parents because Bea is the first girl he’s ever been friends with, and she’s the best.

“Why are you up here on your own?” Pedro asks, the summer before he turns eleven and starts high school. Pedro is a name Hero came up with when she, Peter, and Bea had been distorting each other’s names, and for some reason it had been so funny that they kept using it. And then everyone did.

“Dunno. Don’t really know the Duke’s,” John shrugs, tying and untying his shoe laces.

“Well, hiding in the bathroom isn’t a very good way to start getting to know them, is it?” Pedro reasons.

“Don’t talk to me like I’m a baby. I hate that,” John sighs, but there’s no bite to it. He just looks mopey.

“Is everything okay? With Susan, and stuff?” Pedro asks.

“Jesus, Susan is fine, okay?”

“Okay.” Pedro frowns, “So if nothing’s wrong, why are you all sad?”

“I just… I don’t want to talk to all those people,” John says.

“Well, they’re my friends, and they’re Dad’s friends, so I think you should,” Pedro insists.

“I just told you I don’t want to!” John snaps.

“You tell me not to talk to you like a baby, but you act like one,” Pedro sighs, turning to go down the stairs.

For some reason, John begins to cry.

 

Pedro scores the goal in his first match for Messina High and feels the cheers of the crowd ripple through him. He has made everyone so happy, and it makes him happy, too. All his team mates tell him good job, and Ben, who is loud and funny and silly, tells him he’s a miracle. And his Dad grins at him from the stands. He feels their praise wash over him like a wave he could never drown in. In that moment, everyone telling him he is good, he doesn’t think of anything but that he is.

The kid… Pedro thinks his name is like Barney or something? It’s a weird name, anyway. The kid is walking over to him really slowly. Like not just in pace, but in direction too. He talks to Ursula, then he sidesteps along the wall, before stopping, checking his phone, and then walking with a little more determination towards where Pedro, Ben and Meg are sat, before he stops, and walks in the other direction, trying to play it off like it’s a totally natural thing to do. It’s weirding Pedro out, but also it’s kind of… endearing? Like, not in a gay way, it’s just… Pedro is kind of flattered to be making someone nervous. 

“I’m going to go get more water, see you guys in a sec,” Pedro says, interrupting whatever conversation he hadn’t been paying attention to, and wanders over to the fountain. He sees the kid spot him out of the corner of his eye, and then he’s brisk-walking over with a look of determination on his face.  
“Hey Pedro,” He says, looking unflinchingly at Pedro’s left shoulder.

“Hey,” Pedro says, and pauses for a second before he says, “Balthazar,” with absolute confidence. There’s no point in half-assing a guess at someone’s name. You have to go all in. He’s right, apparently, if the way the guy- Balthazar- looking up from his shoulder and into his eyes with a shy little smile on his face says anything.

“Yeah, uhm, did you want to maybe come to my birthday party this weekend?” He asks all in a rush, twisting his fingers around nervously.  
Pedro, ever the easy people pleaser, says yes.

 

“So, yeah, I was man of the match. It was awesome,” Pedro grins down the phone, distracted by his Mum setting a sandwich down in front of him. He thanks her and kisses her cheek, missing what John says.

“Come again?” He asks, taking a bite, and then giving Mum a thumbs up. She beams at him.

“Nothing. Well done,” John says, but he doesn’t sound enthusiastic. John never sounds enthusiastic, but on a scale of enthusiasm, this is even below how he usually speaks. This makes his general monotone sound animated in comparison.

“Is there something wrong,” Pedro asks, and he hears a long sigh on the other end.

“Fine,” John says. His accent is completely different to Pedro’s now. He can’t even hear the traces of his New Zealand roots in it. 

“What’s the weather like there?” Pedro asks, and John laughs. It’s not a particularly happy laugh, but it’s not particularly sad either.

“It’s raining,” He says, and Pedro can hear the smile in his voice.

“Share the joke?” Pedro asks, and John just laughs again.

“No joke,” He says, “Anyway, have to run, but I’m coming down in a couple of weeks anyway. I’ll see you on the bright side.” 

Most eleven year olds Pedro knows aren’t as... as John as John is.

 

“It’s not like I’ve never heard you before!” Pedro says, and Balthazar just blushes harder.

“I know, it’s just, like, ugh-“He says, planting his face in his hands.

“Come on, just play me a little of it, it sounded so good from the stairs!”

Balthazar looks at him through his hands, and something… something about it makes Pedro feel extremely fond and happy.

“Ugh… I- fine.” Balthazar sighs, grinning a little bit.

“Yes! Yay!” Peter cheers, raising his hands up in the air like a dork, but not feeling like a dork at all when it makes Balthazar giggle and shove his shoulder.

And then Balth plays him the most beautiful music he thinks he’s ever heard in his life. For a moment, there is no pressure at all.

 

It’s not that Pedro doesn’t like it when John visits, of course he does, he’s his little brother and he loves him and he wants him near all the time, it’s just that any interaction with him at all just… drains him.

 

Pedro’s Dad starts dating a nice lady called Ann, who he’s totally smitten with, and it feels like a punch to the gut. Pedro looks at the two of them across the dining room table and thinks about all the nasty things he could say. He could ask Dad how many more women he was going to settle down with, or if Pedro could expect another bastard brother, or why his Dad wouldn’t even try with Mum. But instead he smiles, and tells Ann her average cooking is awesome, and welcomes her into his home like it’s nothing. And when he leaves to go to bed he stops at the doorway and listens.

“He’s lovely!” Anne says, and Pedro sighs a breath of relief.

“He is,” Says his Dad. It’s enough.

 

John is present for Pedro’s fifteenth birthday party, or he’s there, at least.

Meg and Ursula are present. Leo is present. Claudio is present- he slaps Pedro on the arm and calls him a legend. Hero is present- she makes a beautiful cake and calls Pedro her big brother. Ben is present- he jumps on Pedro’s back and buys him a whole bunch of movies he wants to watch with him, and tells him he’s The Best. Bea is present- she is lovely and beautiful, and makes the trip down from wellington. She wears a dress and kisses his cheek and makes him a ridiculous card full of inside jokes. Balthazar is present- a little hesitant around Pedro’s friends, who he’s slowly becoming acquainted with. He plays his ukulele, and laughs so hard at Pedro’s stupid jokes he has to lean on him for support. He plays a quiet little song especially for him when most of the guests have left, and it’s only his best friends left. His best friends eat cake and dance and smother him with affection and are _present_. 

And John is there.

 

“I’m staying,” John says a week later.  
“Awesome!” Pedro says, a beat too late.

 

John does not disclose the reason for his sudden move. Pedro never sees or hears him contact Susan, or even mention her. Ann and Dad are being really nice to him, and it’s all just a bit weird. He’s never been close to Susan but he doesn’t know what she could have done to cause this.

 

“You’re quiet,” John says, perched at the end of the bed like he doesn’t really want to be there.

“Yeah, says you,” Pedro shoots back. And then they both are.

 

It’s fine, it’s not good, but it’s _fine_ until John actually starts doing stupid shit. He doesn’t try in school and he pulls the fire alarm in Pedro’s big game, and he glares. The glaring isn’t all that stupid until it results in people asking him what the fuck John’s looking at, and then the continuous, silent glaring is very stupid indeed. 

Ann and Dad and Mum, when she sees him, tiptoe around John like he’s made of glass, and it’s so frustrating. They’re letting him throw his life away.

 

“I guess, uhm,” Pedro says, laying on Balthazar’s floor, looking at the shelf with all his CD’s. He doesn’t finish his sentence until the next day when they’re eating pasta, and Balth is looking at him with big, honest eyes. “I guess I’m bi,” He concludes, and Balthazar reckons that’s cool.

 

“You’re letting them down,” Pedro says, stood outside John’s room one afternoon with the door slightly ajar, as John lays motionless on the bed, staring at the wall like there’s something fascinating about it. John stops staring at the wall, and stares at Pedro instead. “When you skip school, when you do stupid shit, you let our parents down.”

“Probably,” He says, in a voice that is very tired indeed, and Pedro is so, unbelievably _angry_

“Do you care about anything?” He shouts.

“I guess not,” John drawls, the smile on his face an empty, ugly thing. Pedro shakes his head, and stalks to his room, and gives up.

 

Bea tells the camera he’s an all-round great guy, and he, stupidly, believes it. He buys into his nonsense. He’s so glad she’s here, and when he tells her he loves her and she laughs, he takes it like a punch to the face. And he laughs too.

Something ugly inside him wants to fuck her over, so he makes the stupid plan to set her up with Ben.

And then something uglier inside him believes John’s lies, and runs with them, and sticks to Claudio instead of Ben or Bea or Balthazar.

Something ugly inside of him wants to call Hero a slut, and forget everyone he cares about, and then something ugly comes back at him when he finds out he was wrong.

And then he realises there was never one ugly thing inside of him. It was all of him, all along.

 

He knows they’re not particularly close, but he hadn’t known John had hated him until he said it explicitly. After everything with Hero, after the elaborate plan and the public shaming and the burning of bridges. After Pedro exposing that he wasn’t ever really what everyone thought he was, and after John disappeared for weeks, he posted a video where he explained that he hated him, and explained exactly why.

Pedro cries after he watches it. He wants to call Balthazar but he doesn’t. He wants to go outside or talk to his Mum or read a book but he sits down and watches it again. And again. And again.

 

Seeing him is the most desperate and bursting relief. He thinks ‘I am so angry’ and ‘I am so relieved’ and ‘I don’t know what to do.’ He runs to him like he’s barefoot on coals, and grabs him before he can flinch away. It’s very dramatic, the hillside and him running, Johns skinny body being wrapped around by Pedro’s. John is tall and lanky and dark in every way that Pedro is broad and fair and stout. He is hard bones, and Pedro is soft edges, and they crash into each other on the hillside.

“I’m sorry, I forgive you, I’m sorry, I forgive you,” Pedro says like a mantra, and John says it too, his voice so small next to Pedro’s booming one. He mumbles it and Pedro chants it, until their words are all mangled. He’s squeezing him so hard neither of them can breathe. It is so, so good.

 

After the stupid apology party where he talks things out with Bea and stays up until the early hours of the morning with Ben, and almost tells Balthazar how he feels about him, after everything is starting to feel like it might be okay again, John is crying on the roof. Not, like, dramatically sobbing as he stands at the edge, just perched outside his windowsill, crying silently.

Pedro climbs out and joins him.

“Why are you crying?” Pedro asks, and John doesn’t answer him, but he leans against him heavily, shaking a little bit. “Is it just... nothing you can name?” Pedro asks, and John shakes his head. “Is it Dad and Ann again?” He asks, and John goes still, but shakes his head once more. Pedro doesn’t want to guess again, because he’s guessing he’s let John down. “I never… I wondered, but I never asked, why you came to Auckland,” John hesitates, and sniffs, tensing. “John…” Pedro starts, and his voice cracks, “John, what happened to Susan?”

“She couldn’t take care of me anymore,” He whispers, tears in his voice.

“Why?” Pedro asks the roof tiles.

“She couldn’t take care of herself.”

Pedro wraps his arms around John, his big, stupid arms, on the cold stupid roof top. None of it’s fair, and he says as much to John who agrees.

 

John flops into his room, and ends laying top and tail on the bed with him. He huffs.

“What’s up?” Pedro asks.

“Just. Ann and Dad, on about all that school I missed. It’s like… I would get it, if they were talking about that among everything else but they just… they haven’t mentioned it except for in really contextualised terms, you know? Like they wanna talk about all the consequences of me running away but not… they won’t acknowledge it actually happening, at the same time. Do you get what I mean?” 

“I dunno, contextualised is a really big word,” Pedro frowns, and John gets that he’s joking after just a small beat of silence, kicking his shoulder a little and doing that huffy little snicker thing that Pedro’s only really just been let in on. It stirs something warm in his stomach; making John laugh. His belly and his throat and his fingers all tingle. “No, I get it,” Pedro affirms.

“I just… any other parent would surely see their fifteen year old son running away as some kind of cry for help, right?” John asks. He’s clearly aiming to sound light hearted, but there’s this quiet, desperate hysteria underneath it. It tugs at Pedro’s gut.

“Was it?” He asks, after a pause, practically whispering, “A cry for help, is that kind of what It was?”

John frowns. “I… mostly I was really ashamed.” He admits, slowly, like he’s thinking hard about each word before he forces it out in his muttered grumble. Pedro can’t see his face, but they’re staring at the same ceiling, and he can feels John’s foot on his shoulder still, his weight on the other half of the bed. He thinks any more than that would be too much. “Like, I thought that I wouldn’t care about hurting everyone like I did but… Hero was so devastated. And then Bea and Meg and Ben and… and seeing you like that. It wasn’t whatever I thought it would be. I don’t know… I just was in a bad place. Had been for a really long time and my head- my head was pretty fucked, honestly.” He laughs, but it’s humourless. Pedro wants to hold John’s hand, but they’ve never really done that. Not even when they were kids. John swallows and continues, “I just… I wanted to disappear for a bit. But there was also this, uh, this self-important part of me that was just like, you know, maybe they’ll miss me now I’m gone. They’ll… this is going to make it real to them, force them to acknowledge that there’s something wrong with… that I’m not well. I think that was part of why I did this whole thing. I just... I needed someone to, like, realise. To, um, worry.” John explains, sounding supremely uncomfortable. Sounding small and lost and so, so lonely.

Pedro sits up fairly abruptly, and John follows suit. He won’t look away from his hands, his little shaking fingers, so Pedro plants both of his hands firmly on John’s shoulders. His throat is all dried up from trying not to cry, from the wave of disappointment in himself he feels wash over him.

“I’m worried about you, John. I want you to be better, and I think you need help, and I… I should have been there for you. We all should. There’s properly, really, something… different, about your mental health. And we need to address it,” He says, trying to sound clear and composed, authoritative. Johns head snaps up, and his eyes are dark and wet but they’re not empty. They are so full of pain and relief and Pedro sees in him the small boy he is, the little brother who won’t play games with him, Always Moody John is shedding tears like he always has done, and Pedro doesn’t turn away from him. He finds his cheeks wet too, pressed into Johns shoulder as they hug fiercely, hug like they had when he’d first seen his lanky body climbing up the hillside, knowing it was him instantly. 

“I’m sorry, god, I’m so sorry,” Pedro says, running his hands over the back of Johns head. He’s not going to let anyone hurt him again. He’s going to protect him like he always should have.

“No, me, I’m… Jesus, Peter, I am,” John replies.

“Don’t be,” Peter says resolutely, “Don’t be. Anymore.”

John sniffs.

“I won’t if you won’t,” He bargains. 

And Pedro knows he shouldn't lie, his Dad was always so insistent on that, but Dad also told him he should only like girls and trust his gut and that he’s a good boy, so Pedro decides that Dad’s word doesn't matter so much.

John needs him to, so he says that he accepts.

**Author's Note:**

> So, this mostly follows canon? The Donaldson parental arrangement isn't really touched on that much in nmtd, lolilo, or the original play so I just worked off the little bits and made this really complicated thing? idk but it works with the canon I'm pretty sure.


End file.
